Reacting to a weekend statement by the head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog who said there was no evidence that Iran was working to build nuclear weapons, Herve Morin said France had drawn the opposite conclusion.

“Our intelligence, corroborated by that of other countries, gives us the opposite feeling,” Morin said during a visit to the United Arab Emirates. His comments, made at a news conference, were aired on France’s LCI television.

And I’m told that recent polling data shows that Americans–sensibly enough–think that Israeli intelligence on this subject is more reliable than the CIA’s. Let the gnashing of teeth begin across the river…